HSBC set a new record low rate today but a top mortgage adviser doesn’t expect more rate drops to follow.

First-home buyers are still keen to buy and investors are still finding their way back into the property market, analytics firm CoreLogic says.

The latest CoreLogic buyer classification data showed the share of residential property purchased by first-home buyers increased by a point to 24% in August.

CoreLogic senior research analyst Kelvin Davidson said the ability to access their KiwiSaver funds for a deposit is helping first-home buyers get into the property ladder.

“KiwiBuild will mean that FHBs’ share of purchases may stay elevated in future,” he noted.

The data also suggest mortgaged multiple property owners (MPOs) have held their ground in the past couple of months, sitting at 24% in August.

It also points to improving credit flows to investors, with the $1.33 billion of new lending in July up by about $270 million from a year ago.

“It’s often hard to know whether an increase in credit flows have been driven predominantly by borrower demand or by lender supply (or both), but whatever the cause, more finance will be underpinning MPOs’ higher market share,” Davidson said.

He added that tentative signs that the “lending purse strings are starting to loosen will be a welcome development across the buyer groups.”